


Smells Like Love

by shiphitsthefan



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 5 Times, AroDeanWeek 2015, Aromantic Castiel, Aromantic Dean, Bisexual Dean, Fluff, Humor, Hunter Retirement, M/M, Men of Letters Bunker, Misunderstandings, Past Cassie Robinson/Dean Winchester, Past Lisa Braeden/Dean Winchester, Supportive Sam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-16
Updated: 2015-10-16
Packaged: 2018-04-26 14:11:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5007760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shiphitsthefan/pseuds/shiphitsthefan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Sam tried to tell Dean he was aromantic, and one time Dean told someone else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smells Like Love

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Aro!Dean Week, everybody! It's time to celebrate our favorite aromantic bisexual, so put on your party hats and get some pie.
> 
> Thanks to [pecanpiedean](http://pecanpie.co.vu/) for introducing me to the concept of an aromantic Dean and for being a kick ass human being. You've helped me begin to understand myself, for which I'm very grateful.
> 
> Thanks, too, to My Lady of Perpetual Beta, [betty days](http://archiveofourown.org/users/sadrobots/pseuds/betty%20days). No romo.

The first time Sam asked him, Dean misheard and started sniffing his pits to make sure he was wearing deodorant.

"I smell awesome, Sammy," he said.  "Don't know what the fuck you're talking about."

Sam opened his mouth to reply, but no words came out.  He sat there with his journal in one hand, a pen in the other, and his mouth hanging agape like a fish with no instinct for survival.  Sam had planned this conversation in his head for over a month; what he hadn’t planned for was the roadblock that mondegreen built.

"'Are you aromatic?’" Dean repeated in the most obnoxious impression of Sam he could muster, rolling his eyes for his own benefit before diving back into his novel.

Sam sighed and resigned himself to trying again in the morning.  "I just got this whiff of bullshit over here and figured it was coming from you."

Dean laughed, and Sam smiled, and they returned to their reading.

 

* * *

 

The second time went about as well.  Perhaps it was because Sam approached it academically.  Then again, maybe it was because he introduced the subject before Dean had his coffee.  It could even have been because he led off with the L-word, which is easily Dean's least favorite topic, which is kind of why Sam prompted this discussion in the first place.

"Did you know," he began after jogging into the kitchen, fresh from his morning run, "that the ancient Greeks defined four different types of love?"

"Sounds fake, but okay," Dean mumbled as he swished his coffee around in his mug.

"There's agape, which describes love that is selfless and unconditional.  Agape is about sacrifice and helping your fellow human beings with no expectation of reward."

"Well doesn't that sound fucking familiar."

"Philia is a platonic love," Sam continued, "one that denotes—"

"That sounds like a sandwich."

Sam blinked.  "What?"

"Philia," Dean said.  "Makes me want a cheesesteak."

"Of course it does.  Anyway, where agape is a verb, philia is a noun and—"  Sam hesitated as Dean pushed away from the table.  "Dean, where are you going?"

"Ain't got time for grammar," Dean told him.  "We need to make a grocery run."

 

* * *

 

The third time is really a continuation of the second because Sam is hopeful to a fault.

"Storge is the type of love we feel for family and friends," he said in the car on their way to the nearest supermarket.  "It's a love that means security and comfort."

"What, because you store your feelings with them?"

Sam wrinkled his nose in confusion.  "I don't get it."

"Storage," Dean elaborated.  "If it's called storage, then it means there are emotions goin' somewhere."

"Storge, Dean.  Not storage.   _Storge."_

"Yeah, okay, whatever," said Dean with a dismissive wave of his hand.  "C'mon, give me the fourth one so I can figure out what the fuck the point of all this is."

"The fourth love," Sam continued, his eyebrows knitting themselves together as he attempted not to make a sour face, "is eros.  It's about passion and romance."

"The Greeks had a special kind of love for archers?"

"No, Dean, ero—You know what?  Never mind."  Sam slumped over against the window and tried to figure out his next approach.  This was much harder than he ever expected.

 

* * *

 

The fourth time, Sam decided to approach the problem cinematically.  He also chose to argue from the opposite direction; after all, Sam was not only pre-law, but Lucifer’s vessel.  If anyone could play devil’s advocate, it was Sam fucking Winchester.

"Dean?" he asked over their cheesesteaks later that day.

"What's up, Sammy?"

"You know how in _Pacific Rim,_ Raleigh and Mako aren't a couple?  How you expect them to kiss at the end, but they don't?"

Dean tilted his head as he chewed his bite of sandwich.  "I didn't expect them to kiss."

"But they were set up romantically the entire film."

"Not really," Dean scoffed.  "I mean they're as close as two humans can possibly be, yeah?  They share brainspace."

"Don't you think that's kind of...intimate, though?" asked Sam.

"Well, yeah," agreed Dean.  "That doesn't mean they're dating.  Or even boning.  I mean technically they're already inside each other but—"

"Okay, what about _Fury Road?"_ Sam interrupted.

"What about it?"

"Max and Furiosa."

"What about _them,_ then?"

"Didn't you expect them to be an item by the end of the movie, considering everything they'd been through together?" asked Sam.

Dean shook his head slowly.  "No.  It's the Apocalypse.  No one's got room for chick flick moments in the Apocalypse, Sam."

"Okay," Sam said, setting down his sandwich.  "Had it ever occurred to you that they might have romantic feelings for each other?"

"I mean, they could be more than friends," Dean conceded, "but they're not, like, a _thing_ or anything.  Not gonna go shack up in a cave and play house.  What they've got's bigger than that.  More profound."

Sam winced internally at Dean’s use of the word ‘profound’.   _Obliviousness, thy name is brother._  "How so?"

"They're family," said Dean.  "They need each other to survive.  Plain and simple."

"So they love each other like family?"

Dean popped the last bit of sandwich into his mouth before saying something that sounded like, "Only love there is."

Sam nodded, satisfied to end the discussion there for the moment.

 

* * *

 

The fifth time, Sam asked Dean flat-out if he had ever been in love.

"Dude, I lived with Lisa and Ben for a year.  Of course I was in love with her."

"So how did it feel?"

Dean frowned.  "As compared to what?"

"I don't know," said an exasperated Sam, "maybe your love for Mom."

"That's gettin' into a whole weird kinky area."

"Not like _that,_ Dean.  Jesus, how do I explain this..."  Sam took several long, deep, centering breaths before continuing.  "When I looked at Jess sometimes, I'd get butterflies in my stomach—"

"Oh no," groaned Dean.  "No girl talk.  I can't handle girl talk."

"Shut up and stop being an insensitive misogynistic jerk," Sam said.

“...Yeah, that actually was kind of uncalled for.  You really loved her.  Sorry, Sam."  He indicated that Sam should continue, so Sam did.

"When I kissed her, everything suddenly felt right with the world, like nothing bad could ever happen.  I couldn't imagine anyone or anything ever taking her place.  Being with her satisfied this emotional need within me.  Loving her was different from loving anyone else."

Dean grabbed blindly for the remote and paused _Black Swan._  "What do you mean 'different'?"

"It was the same way with Amelia," Sam continued.  "It was more than the love I felt for Cas, a friend; it was more than the love I felt for you, a brother.  Being in love made me feel complete."

"Can you...Man, there's something here I'm just not getting.  I lived with Lisa.  We slept together.  We were best friends.  What more is there?"

"Dean," started Sam, "there's no real way to explain romantic love.  It's something you feel.  Loving someone and being _in_ love _with_ them _feels different."_

Dean just stared.

"Did you feel the same kind of familial, protective love for Lisa and Ben that you feel for me and Cas?"

After a long pause, Dean quietly said, "Yeah.  It's stronger for you guys, and there’s never anyone I’d put before you, Sam, but...yeah."

"Did you feel anything beyond that?  With her or Cassie or anybody else?"

Dean looked down at his hands.  "I didn't know I was supposed to.  I thought being in love just meant...I don't know, a best friend I wanted to hang out with and fuck exclusively and cuddle once in awhile or something."  He clenches his jaw, and then his fists, and then pushes himself up and off the bed.

"Where are you going?"

"I need to think," Dean threw back over his shoulder on his way out of Sam's room.

 

* * *

 

Sam jogged into the kitchen the next day after his morning run.  He expected to see a slightly grumpy, bleary-eyed Dean nursing his coffee, the same as every morning since their semi-retirement.  Instead, the kitchen was empty.  

Confused, Sam started looking through the bunker.  War room—no Dean.  Library—no Dean.  Dean's room—

Bingo.

He heard Dean talking to someone, so he slowed his walk to a vertical crawl—not precisely eavesdropping, but listening nevertheless.

"Cas," said Dean, "you remember how you said that one time that angels don't fall in love, and I said that was stupid and I couldn’t be with someone who didn’t need me like I needed them and..."  Dean sighed before continuing.  "And I pushed you away?  Told you to leave?"

Sam's breath caught in his throat.  This wasn't exactly what he expected would happen, though he had certainly hoped for reconciliation.

"I was talking to Sam yesterday, and he said some...some stuff that made me think about what you told me.  I misunderstood you, and I misunderstood myself.  I think maybe...I think maybe I don't fall in love, either.  But I want to be with you, and I...I need you, Cas.  And I didn't think we could work because you weren't in love with me, but I had a lot of assumptions about what that meant that apparently...Well, aren't true.

"So I did some research, and I think Sam's right.  I think I might be aromatic, too."

Sam sighed loudly and continued walking.  "Aro _man_ tic, Dean," he yelled down the hall in frustration as he went.  "Aro _man_ tic."

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is also [crossposted to Tumblr](http://shiphitsthefan.tumblr.com/post/131255910344/smells-like-love); if you enjoyed the fic, I would greatly appreciate your reblogging it.
> 
> You can find me on my [Tumblr](http://shiphitsthefan.tumblr.com/). I also chirp occasionally witty things on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/shiphitsthefan).
> 
> Kudos and comments validate my existence. <3


End file.
